1. Technical Field
The present disclosure relates generally to an output power protection apparatus and a method of operating the same, and more particularly to a DC output power protection apparatus, which is applied to an electric vehicle or a hybrid electric vehicle, and a method of operating the same.
2. Description of Related Art
Because of the environmental awareness today, the hybrid electric vehicle (HEV) with energy-saving and low-pollution advantages is increasingly popular. In addition, the HEV is a vehicle which combines advantages of large output power, good endurance, and low noise. Accordingly, the HEV is more competitive to become the mainstream vehicle in the future.
Reference is made to FIG. 1 which is a schematic block diagram of a related art in-vehicle power conversion system. The in-vehicle power conversion system includes a DC converter 20A, a high-voltage battery 40A, and a low-voltage battery 50A. The DC converter 20A receives an input DC power Vin and converts the input DC power Vin into an output DC power Vout to supply the required power to a low-voltage device 30A. In general, the DC converter 20A is a non-isolated converter with the advantages of simple circuit structure, low costs, and high efficiency. However, it does not meet the safety requirements once the existing DC converter 20A occurs a short-circuit condition between the high-voltage side and the low-voltage side because the elements of the DC converter 20A are damaged. In addition, the low-voltage battery 50 may be reversely connected in polarity to the system so that the low-voltage battery 50 is damaged. In other words, the short-circuit condition between the high-voltage and low-voltage sides and the polarity reverse of the low-voltage battery 50 would reduce the power supply reliability of the electric vehicle or the hybrid electric vehicle can be increased. Also, it is to increase the additional costs of replacing the damaged devices or elements because the low-voltage battery 50A or the low-voltage device 30A is damaged. In addition, the malfunction of the electric vehicle or the hybrid electric vehicle would cause car accidents from abnormal operations or damage of the low-voltage battery 50A or the low-voltage device 30A.
Accordingly, it is desirable to provide an output power protection apparatus and a method of operating the same to applied to the non-isolated converter and isolated converter, increase the power supply reliability, save unnecessary costs of replacing the damaged devices or elements, and avoid the car accidents from abnormal operations.